SOTA DX – VK1 to Europe Long Path Propagation

Tuesday 13 October 2020 – I noticed the Australian Space Weather report MUF and T index were reporting ‘enhanced’ conditions while the K index was close to zero, excellent! I checked the local weather forecast, which with the exception of Thursday, indicated rain for the week. Thursday it is!!

Plan: Thursday 15 October 2020, activate Mt Ainslie VK1/AC-040 after work from 0600 UTC to sunset 0820 UTC (1700h to 1920h local). Choice of HF Bands; 7 and 14 MHz, primarily 14 MHz. I contacted my good friend Herbert OE9HRV in Bregenz asking if he might have the opportunity to listen for me? Yes! Andrew was the reply.

Equipment: FT-857D, 2 x 8Ah LiFePO4 batteries, linked Inverted V dipole for 17/20/30/40m bands, 7 metre telescopic pole, 10m RG58AU coax. I plan to operate the 857 at 50 watts output.

I posted a note to the SOTA reflector of my intention to activate Mt Ainslie for long path propagation. The note generated a fair amount of interest from EU SOTA chasers and two UK SOTA activators, keen for a UK – VK1 Summit to Summit (S2S) QSO. I asked myself is this an opportunity to regenerate interest in SOTA DX long path during the solar minima? I think it is 🙂

https://reflector.sota.org.uk/t/vk1-to-eu-uk/24098

My assessment of the space weather conditions (hunch) paid off. 20m long path propagation opened at 0645 UTC for approximately 1 hour. Band conditions were excellent and the 14 MHz background noise floor at Mt Ainslie was low. I immediately thought back to 2013 – 2015 where you could confidently work Europe chasers with an FT-817 at 5 watts output.

20m DX Window Long Path propagation
0645 UTC to 0745 UTC

Result – DX SOTA Chasers (SSB mode)
20m (14.320 and 14.315 MHz): 15
40m (7.130 and 7.150 MHz): 7

VK QSOs
20m: Nil
40m: 6

DX Countries worked
Russia, Japan, Italy, France, Austria, New Zealand, Germany, Hungary, Spain, Croatia and Columbia, yes Columbia!

VK States
VK2, VK4, VK5 and VK7. With the exception of Mark VK1EM/2 located in NSW, I didn’t receive a call from local VK1 chasers, quite odd!

QRN on 40m 😦
Nearby storms (1000 km away) were generating S9 QRN. Conditions on 40m made hearing weak signal reception quite difficult. Note to self – I spent too long on 40m, I should have dedicated that time to 20m chasers.

Extract of VK1AD SOTA Activator Log: Mt Ainslie 15 October 2020

Maps curtsey of SOTA Mapping

UK Activators: I did hear Mike 2E0YYY on 40m (7.181 MHz) operating from Gun G/SP-013, I called S2S a number of times but didn’t make the distance. Andy G6PJZ was activating Cringle Moor – Drake Howe G/TW-002 on 14.310 MHz, I listened a few times for Andy without luck. 😦

Short 23 second video from Herbert’s radio shack, 14.320 MHz.

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/zbqgt7zarzq9flh/AAB9YSm-Ju_myS8VpIdeUex5a?dl=0

Time	Callsign	Band	Mode	Notes
06:08	UA3EDQ	14MHz	SSB	Igor s58 r56
06:10	JH1MXV	14MHz	SSB	Hatori s57 r53
06:34	F5JKK	7MHz	SSB	Eric s57 r44
06:35	IK4GRO	7MHz	SSB	Lauro s57 r54
06:38	F5JKK	7MHz	SSB	Eric s58 r45
06:38	VK7DW	7MHz	SSB	Andrew s59 r49
06:40	VK4SMA	7MHz	SSB	Mark s59 r57
06:44	F4GMM	7MHz	SSB	Ludovic s58 r53
06:44	OE9HRV	7MHz	SSB	Herbert s58 r44
06:46	ZL2ATH	7MHz	SSB	Wynne s57 r57
06:55	F5JKK	14MHz	SSB	Eric s58 r55
06:57	IK2LEY	14MHz	SSB	Fabio s57 r44
06:59	F5MDY	14MHz	SSB	Nic s57 r52
07:01	OE9HRV	14MHz	SSB	Herbert s59 r57
07:03	DL6MST	14MHz	SSB	Klaus s58 r52
07:05	HA3MQ	14MHz	SSB	Ferenc s58 r57
07:20	EA2DT	14MHz	SSB	Manuel s57 r42
07:22	IK3XJL	14MHz	SSB	Mauro s57 r51
07:24	DK2ZT	14MHz	SSB	Walter s58 r55
07:29	G0RQL	14MHz	SSB	Don s55 r44
07:31	9A2CD	14MHz	SSB	Con s58 r58
07:35	HK7WA	14MHz	SSB	s57 r55
07:45	VK4FTRL	7MHz	SSB	Rick s59 r59
07:47	VK2EMI	7MHz	SSB	Mark s59 r59
07:47	VK1EM	7MHz	SSB	Mark s59 r57
07:48	VK5PAS	7MHz	SSB	Paul s59 r59
07:49	ZL3GIG	7MHz	SSB	Ian s59 r59
08:00	ZL3AWB	14MHz	SSB	Andrew s59 r59

While I don’t have a physics degree, I am convinced there is some form of HF RF wormhole between Mt Ainslie and Europe latitude 41 to 53 degrees 🙂

My SOTA DX history, check the results for Mt Ainslie: https://vk1nam.wordpress.com/sota-dx-from-vk1/

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